Kids Say Steroids Made|Dad Kill Their Mom

SALT LAKE CITY (CN) – A man who was pumped up on prescribed steroids shot his wife 13 times in a parking lot and is serving 20 years to life in prison, their two children say. Their guardian blames the nurse practitioner who prescribed the drugs, and a doctor who allegedly failed to monitor the man.

David Ragsdale killed his wife, Kristy, in a church parking lot on Jan. 30, 2009. He pleaded guilty and was sentenced to 20 years to life with possibility of parole. Their two minor children’s conservator sued nurse practitioner Trina West, her employer Pioneer Comprehensive Medical Clinic, and Dr. Hugo Rodier. In April 2007, West prescribed two steroids to Ragsdale for Attention Deficit Disorder: testosterone and Pregnenolone, according to the complaint. Both are schedule III controlled substances, whose possible side effects include “psychiatric complications such as steroid-induced mania,” according to the complaint The conservator says that West prescribed the drugs, and in May “increased Mr. Ragsdale’s doses of the steroids without consulting Hugo Rodier M.D., or any other medical doctor.” In July 2007, West prescribed Concerta, or methylphenidate, a schedule II “psychostimulant drug … [which’ carries many of the same risks associated with methamphetamine,” according to the complaint. Again, she prescribed the drug “without consulting Hugo Rodier, M.D., or any other medical doctor,” according to the complaint. In September 2007 she “doubled David Ragsdale’s doses of Concerta, from 36 mg to 72 mg per day,” the complaint states. Again, she is accused of doing so without consulting the doctor. By late December, according to the complaint, Ragsdale was taking Concerta, Valium, Doxepin, Paxil, Pregnenolone and Propecia, daily, and testosterone weekly, the last by injection. He killed his wife on Jan. 6, 2008, by shooting her “thirteen times in a church parking lot, in broad daylight, in front of several witnesses,” the complaint states. He turned himself in to police within 2 hours. The conservator seeks punitive damages for negligence. The children, now 6 and 3, are represented in Salt Lake County Court by Tyler Young with Young, Kester & Petro.